I felt her standing silently beside me for a long time, and then her hand touched my head, and she did a strange thing: she went down on her knees beside me, lifted up my face with her hand, just as Roger used to do, and stared at me. Then she threw her arms about me and drew me up close, and I knew that at last Lolly had forgiven me.
She could cry, but not I. I had reached that stage where tears are beyond us. They precede the rainbow in our lives, and my rainbow had been wiped away. I was out in the dark, blindly groping my way, and it seemed to me that though there were a thousand doors, they were all closed to me.
I was now sitting on a chair opposite Lolly. I had the feeling that I was crumpled up, crushed, and beaten. My mind was clear enough. I knew what had befallen me, but I could not see beyond the fog.
"I could have told you about him long ago," said Lolly, after a while.
I said mechanically:
"You spared me. I did not you."
"No, you did the right thing," Lolly replied. "If I had told you then what I knew—that Hamilton was a married man—I might have saved you this."
There was silence between us for a time, and then Lolly said:
"Did you know that Marshall Chambers is married? He married a rich society girl—a girl of his own class, Nora."
"Lolly, I don't know what to do. I think I am going to die," I said.